Save the date for FASHIONCLASH Festival 2016, the HERITAGE editionJune 30 – July 3 | various locations in Maastricht

The 8th edition of the international and interdisciplinary fashion festival takes place June 30 – July 3 in Maastricht (The Netherlands).

The 4-day festival program with Fashion Shows, Exhibitions, Performances, Designer Market, Fashion Talks, Awards and Parties gives more than 150 designers and artists from all over the world the opportunity to show their work to a diverse international audience and industry professionals.
The 8th edition of the festival is curated around the theme of HERITAGE, consisting of a theme related and general programme. The festival is a reflection of what is going on within the international fashion scene in the new generation of designers; imagination of the zeitgeist of contemporary fashion design through the eyes of the new generation of designers and artists. FASHIONCLASH Festival is an unique opportunity to discover new talent and to get inspired by the art of fashion.
FASHIONCLASH Festival is accessible to everyone. Most of the program is accessible for free, to attend the Fashion Shows there is a ticket sale starting beginning of May.

Since the first edition in 2009 more than 900 talents from 50 different countries have joined FASHIONCLASH Festival and were given the opportunity to show their talent and work. Some of their careers really took of from there! Take a look at fashionclash.nl for an impression of the event and the activities of FASHIONCLASH throughout the world.

HERITAGE EditionFASHIONCLASH Festival 2016 looks to the future along the theme of ‘Heritage’.

‘Like no other fashion knows how to renew itself again and again by creating a new atmosphere each season, using the past as an infinite source of inspiration and by selling and presenting the past as the new future. Designers look back to the past but also dare to speculate about the future. From this perspective designers are shaping the future of the shape of things to come. What is the role of our cultural heritage in a constantly changing world? How are new generation designers dealing with their cultural heritage (ancestry and traditions) in a globalized world where everything seems to be reachable and in which fashion is dominated by Fast Fashion chains and mass-production? Where do you come from, where do you go?’

Campaign LaunchIn relation to the theme of Heritage a campaign is created with an editorial and fashion film in collaboration with Lonneke van der Palen, Studio Noto, M.A.C. Cosmetics, KEVIN.MURPHY and WEDOVOODOO.TV. In this editorial work of emerging designers is included such as Merel Bos, Jivika Biervliet, Noir Near Future and Minou Lejeune.

FASHIONCLASH Festival is an initiative of the Maastricht based FASHIONCLASH Foundation and its artistic and managing directors Branko Popovic, Laurens Hamacher and Nawie Kuiper. The ‘clash’ in FASHIONCLASH represents the encounter between talent, cultures, artistic disciplines, the audience and fashion. FASHIONCLASH believes that the art of fashion can stimulate critical debate about controversial issues in our society. By researching and questioning ‘fashion’ we learn to understand the psychology of human behaviour and its role in undermining stereotypes. The central question being asked, “How can we develop the fashion industry to improve well-being and equality?”. With themes such as “Age / Art of Aging” (FCF 2014), “Gender” (FCF 2015) and “Heritage” (FCF 2016) we create narratives that rise above the supercial defnition of the word “Fashion”.

FASHIONCLASH provides a platform by developing and organizing projects and events such as the annual festival ‘FASHIONCLASH Festival’, but have since done several remarkable projects and collaborations in Belgium, South Africa, Poland, China, Portugal, Mauritius, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Serbia, Brazil, Slovenia, Malta and so on.